Remembrance
by Icicle Raindream
Summary: Yulie looks back on how the Ronin Warriors touched his life.


Remembrance

Written by: Icicle Raindream

Disclaimer: The Ronin Warrior characters are not mine, I am solely stealing their names and backgrounds for the purpose of my fiction, not profit.

Notes: C'mon, Yulie (or Jun, if you like the Japanese version) isn't all that bad, is he? Give him a break, he was young then. Tell me what you think of it, maybe it'll change your mind about him!

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I remember.

As I sat in my chair awaiting my turn, I leaned back and closed my eyes, smiling inwardly. 

I remember them all.

I remember Mia—she was my guardian angel. She watched over me unrelentlessly, through hard times and nasty battles. She explained things to me when I was lost and didn't understand. She brought me into her home to live when my own parents had been taken away and positioned herself as my surrogate mother. She cooked me dinner and read me stories. She brought us all together, as a family.

Wow, thinking of family makes me remember the dinner table. Then I think of Kento, and how much he adored food. He was such a fun guy to be with, and I'm glad to have known him. I remember him taking me outside and horsing around with me, wrestling and tossing the football around. He always made me laugh, and treated me like an equal. Always. I never felt like Yulie the Tagalong when I was with Kento. He had a great personality.

Speaking of personalities, I remember Sage. I think sometime after the Ronin Warriors defeated Talpa, Sage really started to shine through to me. I mean the _real _Sage, the one _with_ a personality. Yes, he did have one, he just didn't show it too often, which was too bad, because he was a great guy. And he knew. Every day I snuck out of the house to watch him practice his kendo, he knew I was there. He let me be for a couple weeks, then demanded that I show myself. He taught me kendo. I think that was when I really started to get to know him. He warmed up to me, and we became buddies then.

Thinking of buddies—Rowen. Sage's best buddy, but mine too. Rowen was such a character in himself. I loved spending time with Rowen because he made me feel smart. You'd think it would be the other way around, that he'd make me feel dumb, but no. He would take me outside sometimes late at night, and we would watch the stars and talk. Yeah, I was young then, but we could talk anyway. We'd tell each other about our families, since they were similar. Both of us an only child, a mother and a father. Although unfortunately Rowen made me incredibly thankful that my parents were still together. But then the subject would change and he'd point out specific stars and tell me things about them. It was then that I really came to appreciate the sky and the magic it held.

Now Cye—he was funny, too, in his own little way. I would walk into the kitchen during one of his many experiments and just sit and watch. He would talk lowly to himself as he worked, reading the recipes out loud and sometimes singing. My laughter would build inside me until I couldn't hold it in, and he'd turn, surprised, and laugh with me. Then he would invite me to help him bake something, and we would end up being proud of our masterpiece as the others chowed down happily. It's because of him that I find myself in the kitchen now many times, cooking for my mother, who has grown a little weak from all her years of gardening and nourishing her plants. It's okay, though, I feel like I'm worth it.

Now, if there was anyone who made me feel like I was worth it then, it had to be Ryo. He was my favorite person in the whole wide world then, when I was young. Sometimes I lay in bed at night and I can still feel the sting of his slap and hear the desperation in his voice as he told me to stay. I realize that now it wasn't a game back then at all—it was serious business. But being the young punk that I was, instead of thinking about it, I spouted off with, "I wish I'd never met you!" which was a total lie. I knew _that_ then, at least, that it was a lie. Ryo was the best person I think I'd ever known. If Mia was my foster mother then Ryo had to be my father because I always got the feeling that if he didn't have larger problems on his hands, like Talpa, he would have been the one to watch over me and protect me, which he managed to do anyway. He treated me like a human, not like a child. I'm not saying the others did that all the time, but I never got the feeling that Ryo sometimes got annoyed with me like the others did. He just cared about us all too much.

And my parents never really understood. They didn't know how I had come to be such great friends with these people who were all about six years or older than me. But if they insisted on throwing me a party for my nineteenth birthday, then I insisted on inviting my six friends, my six saviors. My parents hadn't even known how I learned kendo until they finally met Sage. And you know what? They loved my friends. I did, too.

I think it's the love that keeps me going. I know they're all gone now, I can still hear my mother's frantic voice as she asked me if I was okay. I had just learned that there had been a huge crash on the highway, between a small red jeep and a big van. The driver of the van was drunk, and there were no survivors. My friends were gone forever, never to walk the earth that they had so dutifully saved. They had just left my side after wishing me a happy birthday.

I heard my name being called over the loudspeakers just then, and I got up from my chair, opening my eyes. It was time for my kendo match to begin, and as I stood there, ready to face my opponent, I knew what I was doing this for. I was fighting in this tournament to show that my friends were still with me and I still loved them. They had disappeared physically but spiritually they were still with me, and I fought for them. Throughout the rest of my life I knew I'd be fighting for them.

At least I had gotten to live with them, you know? Eight years is a long time for a kid to know someone, especially _six_ someones who had had the greatest influence a person could ever be exposed to.

And as always, I'll remember them.


End file.
